3&Out: On the lift Nathan Carter is providing for Michigan State; special teams decibels; and load management
East Lansing, Mich. – Three quick takes about Michigan State football as we turn the corner from game one and close in on a week two game against Richmond, with notes and thoughts on Nathan Carter, special teams, the secondary, physicality and more.
1. NATHAN CARTER, EXPLOSIVENESS AND POSITIVITY
Nathan Carter hasn’t only injected an element of explosiveness into the running game, he’s also infused a light of positivity into Spartan football.
With the transfer portal and NIL dominating off-season headlines, college football fans might be wondering if players appreciate playing for Dear Old U as much as we would like to think they did in decades gone by. Carter certainly seems to.
The redshirt-sophomore running back who transferred to Michigan State from UConn last winter was in awe of Spartan Stadium when he took the field for the first time, last Friday night.
“It was breathtaking; I will say that,” Carter said. “I definitely got emotional running out of that tunnel and seeing 75,000 people there.”
Carter used a key block from left guard J.D. Duplain in breaking free for a 31-yard gain on his first carry as a Spartan. He finished the game with 113 yards rushing on 18 carries. With quickness and tough leg drive, he looks like the type of instant impact ball carrier that Spartans fans were hoping he would be. And he’s just happy to be here.
“It’s definitely is a blessing to come from a school like UConn, an independent school, and go to the Big Ten and to be able to perform the way I did, I’m so blessed and so grateful,” he said. “I want to continue to perform so we can continue getting wins.”
Those quotes were sandwiched around his effusive salutes for his blockers and quarterback. He says all the right things, and judging by the way his former teammates and coaches at UConn saluted him and wished him nothing but the best on social media after he announced his decision to transfer to Michigan State, this guy is the real deal as a person.
“He’s a pleaser, he wants to get it right,” said Michigan State head coach Mel Tucker. “He’s a great kid. He’s a great teammate. He practices hard, he trains hard. It’s all about the team with him.
“He is a very spiritual kid with very strong faith. He’s an asset, the type of guy you want on your team. You want to be able to coach guys like him and you want to have teammates like him.”
Two years ago, Michigan State struck gold when the Spartans mined Kenneth Walker III out of the transfer portal. Carter is no Walker. There wasn’t another Walker anywhere in college football last year and there probably isn’t one this year. But if first impressions are accurate, Michigan State found another rare Earth commodity in Carter.
“He’s explosive,” Tucker said. “He has good vision. He’s quick. He runs hard and he keeps his feet moving on contact. He’s smart. He’s willing to block in pass pro. He’s accountable, which we’re all trying to be. He has a lot of upside. We’re working to develop him.
“He’s just going to continue to get better because he’s a worker and he never makes excuses. Ever.”
In the fourth quarter, Carter broke loose again for a 31-yard gain, this time thanks in part to a lead block from tight end Evan Morris.
The long runs are pretty, but Carter finds beauty in the process.
“Not every run is going to be a home run touchdown,” he said. “You have to get the dirty threes, the dirty fours, the dirty fives and then that’s when the big one is going to break.”
He’s patient when running behind his blocking, and patient in life.
“This life is short and you don’t play this game forever,” he said. “I want to take advantage of being here, being a Michigan State football player, playing at The Woodshed. Not many people can say that. Me running out of the tunnel, I was just taking it all in and understanding how big of a blessing it is to be here and I don’t want to take that for granted.”
In case you were wondering, yes there are players from the transfer portal who may have gotten some NIL money who still love the jersey in this sport.
2. SPECIAL TEAMS, HIGH DECIBELS
Tyrell Henry had a pretty good 26-yard kickoff return to open the game (thanks in part to a nice block from reserve tight end Jack Nickel), and an even better 18-yard punt return (it’s harder to get an 18-yard punt return than a 26-yard kickoff return, in case you’re wondering why I worded it that way).
Michigan State’s new punter Ryan Eckley averaged a tidy 43 yards per punt. The Spartans punt coverage team would have had one downed inside the 5-yard line if long snapper Hank Pepper hadn’t accidentally swept it into the end zone. (No one felt worse about it than Pepper. And Eckley ran down the field with a chopping motion directed at Pepper, telling him it was okay, keep chopping. That was nice.)
Aside from that little mistake, Pepper was good all night. The Spartans missed him terribly when he was lost for the last half of the 2022 season with an undisclosed ailment.
New kicker Jonathan Kim boomed a 47-yarder that would have been good from 57.
Special teams looked good to me. But apparently not to special teams coordinator Ross Els, who ramped up his vocal cords early this week.
“Special teams meeting on Monday morning was loud,” Tucker said. “Extremely loud, because we missed some plays, left some plays on the field, missed some assignments we should have had, some house calls we should have had, some big hits we should have had, bigger returns. Those are things we have to get cleaned up, but there were a lot of positives.
“I was asked about the kicking game every day in the out-of-season, and we are still a work in progress but we have some guys that are very capable of getting the job done.”
3. TACKLING VS PRESERVING
Tucker set out to lighten the tackling load on his players during spring practice and August camp. After last season was derailed by injuries, Tucker wanted to deliver his players to September as healthy as possible.
Coaches curtailed the hitting, and there was no tackling to the ground, outside of the scrimmages.
Tucker succeeded in one way. The Spartans entered the season healthier than a year ago and, according to some players, fresher.
But does that approach come at a cost? Can Michigan State become as physical as Tucker wants them to be if they don’t practice hitting and tackling hard in practice?
Well, understand that there was a good bit of hard hitting during August camp, just not the type that ends up with twisted bodies at the bottom of piles. That being said, Michigan State’s tackling wasn’t in mid-season form last Friday night, but that’s the way it is with most openers.
“Tackling typically improves (in the second game),” Tucker said. “We hardly ever tackle to the ground (in practice). We have two scrimmages in fall camp and that’s it. So live tackling is kind of shaky in the first game and it was for us in the first half, but it got better as the game went on.”
Add the fact that Michigan State had three true sophomores starting in the secondary, with two combined career starts, and a little slippage was understandable.
“We are young in the secondary but the guys are talented,” Tucker said. “The guys are hungry. I thought they played aggressively and tried to make plays on the ball. They tackled better as the game went on, so it was a good start for us. We still have a lot of work to do.”
Tucker is satisfied with the preseason approach.
“We made a lot of changes and I feel like they paid off,” he said. “We are going to continue to work that way. I think our guys understand how important it is to practice with a certain tempo and be under control and to stay off the ground and take care of bodies.
“It was good to see our depth out there and be able to rotate guys. There were times a year ago when we had a three defensive tackle rotation and one of them was a true freshman. That’s not a winning formula when you’re trying to stop teams in the Big Ten. You have to have seven, eight, nine guys up front that can go in and play for you.”
Michigan State had nine defensive linemen log at least 19 snaps on Friday, and a 10th player (Deandre Butler) played 15 snaps.
“That’s huge,” Tucker said. “It affects your pass defense as well, to be able to get to third down and then rush and cover.”
What about physicality on offense?
“I saw our receivers doing a really good job of blocking,” Tucker said. “I saw (Antonio) Gates and (Jaron) Glover taking guys out. We can always get better at sustaining those blocks.
“Our tight ends did a solid job for the most part but some of those plays that were not efficient, the tight ends didn’t get the job done.
“And inside, (we need) just better technique overall, communication, pad level. But I saw guys finishing, playing through the whistle, being aggressive, finishing on top, finishing forward. Backs were running hard. The quarterback was getting us in and out of the right plays. It was a solid start for us.”
Michigan State players and coaches say they aren’t overlooking Richmond, but it’s possible that this week’s of practice is a mini extension of August camp. Tucker wasn’t planning on tapering things down.
“Everyone was locked in,” Tucker said after the first day of practice this week. “We’ll see what happens as soon as we start putting the pads on. It was a little warm out there (on Monday). So we are going to push them had this week and see how they react.”
For those keeping score, the following is the snap count for defensive linemen during Friday’s victory over Central Michigan:
Simeon Barrow 41, Zion Young 38, Brandon Wright 26, Tunmise Adeleye 23, Avery Dunn 21, Derrick Harmon 20, Khris Bogle 20, Jalen Sami 19, Dre Butler 15, James Schott 10, Ken Talley 2, Ben Nelson 2, Jalen Thompson 1.
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